Arjun tells EC: Quota pc not fixed

HRD Minister has denied the Election Commission's charge that he violated the model code of conduct for elections.

Published on: Apr 11, 2006, 09:23:00 IST

None | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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Striking a defiant note, HRD Minister Arjun Singh has denied the Election Commission's charge that he violated the model code of conduct for elections by announcing the plan for 27 per cent reservation for OBCs in centrally funded higher-education institutes.

He said the talk of another Mandal-type reservation — first reported in the Hindustan Times — was not new. Also, the government had not decided on the percentage of reservation. He said the draft bill propos ing the quota had been approved by the HRD Ministry following an amendment to the Constitution.

On Saturday, the EC had sent a notice to the Cabinet Secretariat, seeking an explanation for the quota announcement. The EC termed the announcement a breach of the model code of conduct as it gave concessions to certain sections of the electorate in Assam, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, West Bengal and Pondicherry.

In his reply, Singh said, “There was no announcement of any concession, much less any other breach of the model code of conduct. There is no basis even for a prima facie view to that effect.” The minister said the EC’s notice, on the basis of media reports, was “unfortunate”.

Taking a dig at the commission, he said, “What’s more, it has also been concluded that it prima facie violates the model code of conduct without mentioning which provision of the model code of conduct the commission had in view.” Quoting two media reports in his defence, the minister said that in a reply to a specific question he had said the decision would be taken and announced only after elections to five state assemblies were over.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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